The Deer Run Trail

by David R Lewis

  Marion smiled. “Reckon I could deputize you,” he said.

  “Doan know about that,” Homer said. “You git yourself two deputy marshals, your head might swell an’ ruin that new slouch hat you’re a wearin’.”

  “I’ll risk it,” Marion said.

  “So will I,” Homer said. “Been a while.”

  “You ain’t forgot much, I bet,” Marion said.

  “Cain’t,” Homer said. “Not even when I try.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  I never spent much time worryin’ if I was a coward or not. I just never had to. I tangled with another kid now an’ then while I was growin’ up, like boys do, but I’d never had occasion to come across nobody that scared me much or tried to do me no serious harm. My daddy was what some folks might have thought of as a hard man, but he warn’t never hard on me. My momma run off with a drummer when I was little an’ we never seen her again. Daddy just bore down an’ took over for her as best he could. He had a trade an’ we never hurt for food or nothin’ like that. He put me in school an’ I learned my letters an’ ciphers. He showed me woodworkin’ as I got older, how to do rough carpentry an’ the finer finish stuff, too. How to git a good miter on corner cuts, an’ how to use oil or beeswax to put a purty finish on a good piece of maple or walnut. How to use a mallet an’ chisel on mortise cuts an’ do delicate stuff like inlays an’ such. He also taught me some how to fight if I had need to an’ protect myself, an’ how to stand up against somebody that might be tryin’ to git the best of me. He was some fond of guns an’ taught me to shoot a handgun an’ rifle pretty good. The Yellaboy I carried had been his. I sold my old single shot after he died, an’ his Colt too, me bein’ partial to my Schofield an’ all. Even in my year a travelin’ I had never been tried, never come in close association with what I woulda called hard men. Then again, I had never run up agin’ anybody like Marshal Marion Daniels or Sheriff Homer Poteet. Not that I thought either of them was hard men. But in listenin’ to ‘em I come to realize that they was men who could git terrible tough if they needed to. It scared me some an’ made me worry about what might be coming my way. Made me wonder if I would do my part if things got rough where we were goin’. If’n I’d hold up under it an’ not freeze or run off, fearful that I might git kilt.

  The three of us were settin’ in front of Homer’s office, them talkin’ about the Duncan bunch, an’ me, hearing only a little of what they said while I gnawed on not lettin’ anybody down or nothin’. Purty soon Marion kindly slapped me on the shoulder with the back of his hand an’ brought me back.

  “You worried about something, Ruben?” he asked me.

  “Yessir, I am,” I confessed.

  “Uh-huh,” he said. “Scairt a little, too?”

  “Truth be spoke,” I said, “I reckon I am some, yes.”

  “First time you been tangled up in somethin’ like this, ain’t it?”

  “It is,” I said.

  He set back in his chair and eyeballed the street, only his eyes seemed to be seein’ somethin’ father away. “Cheer up, boy,” he said. “It don’t never git no easier. Ol’ Homer over here just pissed hisself.”

  “Feels good,” Homer said. “Right warm.”

  The laugh that come outa me was more of a whoop than anything else, an’ it tickled Homer and Marion quite a bit. They got to laughin’ at me laughin’ an’ it took a minute afore we settled down.

  “Rube,” Homer said to me, “yer packin’ a badge now. When ya got one a them on for the right reason, it gives ye a little more than most other fellers. You just do what yer tolt until you run outa that, then do what you think is best. Just like Marion an’ me, you’ll git through it or you won’t. Worryin’ about it ain’t gonna change nothin’ or stop nothin’ or fix nothin’. All worryin’ can do is eat at yer brain. Yer mind can be your biggest disadvantage, boy. You clutter it up with a bunch a bullshit, you ain’t doin’ yerself nor nobody else no good. Whatever happens, you ain’t gonna remember a lot of it anyways. Mostimes, your mind just kinda runs off an’ lets you git on with things. I reckon that’s best. It knows when to leave you alone if you let it. If that don’t work, piss your britches. I find it liberatin’.”

  We stayed in Homer’s jail that night, at least until about halfway through. Then we saddled up an’ took out under a mostly full moon. An hour or so after first light, Homer, riding a hunnerd yards out front, come on the tracks of a lame horse. We followed him, as he followed them, another hour or so until he went up a low rise, slid off his horse near the top, an’ come back down it a ways. Marion dismounted an’ handed me his reins when I hit the ground.

  “Bring mine, Ruben,” he said, “and tie ‘em off about halfway up the slope. Then stay low and come on up.”

  They were on their bellies in scrub at the top of the slope when I crawled up. The sun was mostly behind us, so anybody down below would have a hard time seeing anything agin’ the glare. On the flat, near a quarter mile away, was a low cabin of good size, flanked by a barn, a outbuilding, a outhouse, an’ a couple of corrals. There was a cistern agin the house an’ a covered dug well out front. Marion got one a them pull-out telescopes an’ studied the place for a while.

  “There’s nine horses in the corral, plus the two mules and a nice buckskin I believe belongs to Arliss,” Marion said. “I can see the front of a wagon stickin’ out from behind the barn. I seen movement in the barn mow door and caught a little shadow shift from the edge of the outhouse. At least two of ‘em is outside. Probably got a saddled horse or two in the barn. As I recall, there are three brothers in the Duncan clan. Probably got at least two more fellers with ‘em. Maybe four or more. Can’t tell. Homer, unlimber that Sharps a yourn’ an’ set up. Whoever is down there is guilty of somethin’. You get a shot at anybody, knock him down. They’re waitin’ on us. They may as well know we’re here.”

  Homer went down the slope to his horse an’ come back with the longest rifle I had ever seen. He noticed me staring at it.

  “Forty-five 90 Sharps,” he said. “Thirty-four inch barrel. I got this ‘un from a buffler hunter after them big shaggies was damn near kilt plumb off. Arliss worked it over for me an’ tuned it up.”

  “Arliss did?” I said.

  “Yessir. Ol’ Arliss is a gunsmith. Didn’t you know?”

  “No, I didn’t,” I said.

  “Good as they come. Loads bullets, too. We git all this done, you oughta give him your Yaller Boy to work over. Make it twice as good as it is.”

  He settled in at the top of the rise, flipped up a tall peep sight that stuck up offa the top of the rifle a ways, an’ took sight on the cabin. Me and Marion relaxed an’ watched the place. I was thinkin’ about Arliss being a gunsmith when that Sharps went off. Ten feet away, I felt the shock of it.

  Homer slipped another shell into the breech an’ brought the sight back to his eye. “Got the one behind the outhouse,” he said. “Never did see him. Figured where he was by a slip of shadow an’ shot through the front door. He’s down.”

  “I can just see his foot beside the place,” Marion said, that telescope to his eye.

  In the quiet that come on after the shot, we could just hear the shot fella screech now an’ then, beggin’ for help I speck. I waited to feel bad, but mostly I didn’t feel anythin’. It was too far away to seem real to me.

  In a little bit, another fella come runnin’ out from behind the cabin over to the backside of the outhouse an’ out of sight. I expected Homer to shoot agin, but he didn’t. He just helt his sight an’ waited. Pretty soon that fella come hustling out from behind the outhouse an’ back toward the cabin with the fella that had been shot slung over his back. He was almost to cover when that terrible Sharps went off again. He fell an’ neither one of the men, except for a couple of wiggles, moved or hollered.

  “Right through the back of the one carried and through the one doin’ the carryin’,” Marion said, lowering the telescope. “Got both of ‘em with that shot.”

  Gunfire st
arted up then, from the house an’ the barn mow door, but nothing came close to us. I did see one puff a dirt, but it was down the slope in front of us a piece an’ off to the right a ways.

  “Can’t see us ‘cause of the sun,” Marion said to me, “and can’t reach us with their saddle guns neither. Wake ‘em up, Homer.”

  Homer fired four or five more times pretty quick, sending rounds through the barn mow door an’ the windas of the house. Marion stood up with his coach gun an’ walked down the slope near halfway an’ crouched behind some scrub.

  “You boys are horse and mule thieves and attempted murderers,” he yelled. “C’mon out now and let’s stop this killin’. Give yerselves up, and we’ll all go back to Gasconade and git ya a legal trial. No need for nobody else to git kilt out here today. I’m Marshal Marion Daniels and you got my word on it!”

  Things were quiet for a minute, then the door of the cabin crashed open an’ a heavyset fella come runnin’ out of it in our direction, his hands over his head. He hadn’t gone twenty yards when a shot from the house knocked him down. The Sharps roared agin.

  “Got the one that shot from the door,” Homer said.

  “Gawdammit, boys!” Marion yelled, “that there is enough! Git on out here with your hands up and stop all this!”

  About that time, I watched three or four fellas scatter out of the cabin an’ head for the barn an’ corrals.

  “Aw, hell,” I heard Homer say. “There he goes!”

  Marion was running down the slope an’ toward the cabin for all he was worth. I couldn’t believe it. It hit me so that I waited an’ gawked a little afore I run back down to my horse an’ managed to git in the saddle as he danced away from me. I spurred the sorrel up over the top of the hill an’ down the slope in time to see a Mexican come out of the barn on a big ol’ white horse an’ head straight for Marion, reins in his teeth, firing two pistols. I was too far away to help, an’ Marion just stood there an’ let him come. That Mex was closing with him pretty good when Marion fired his coach gun. The first shot tripped the horse up an’ he fell. The second one hit the Mex as he struggled to his feet an’ put him on his back. I watched Marion drop the scattergun, take his Colt in hand, an’ just stand there, waiting for whatever was next.

  I was off the hill in just a little bit, an’ on the flat about fifty yards from the cabin when somebody shot my sorrel. He grunted an’ faltered, then stumbled some, an’ swerved to the right. I grabbed my Yellaboy out of the scabbard an’ jumped free afore he fell, landin’ on my knees in the dirt. I took aim at one of ‘em runnin’ after a loose horse by the corral an’ hit him in the leg. He went down, then got up tryin’ to run in a sideways lope. I shot agin an’ he went down an’ flopped around some. Homer tore by me on his horse, a pistol in hand, shootin’ at anything that moved then, an’ it was all over.

  Two of ‘em had got away on bareback mounts from the corral. They’d shot one of their own, an’ five more was shot, the one I’d hit the only one still movin’. I walked over and looked down at him as he squirmed an’ grunted. He’d been hit in the leg an’ the low belly. There was more blood that I thought there could be.

  “Who are you?” I asked him.

  “I’m Carl Duncan, you sonofabitch,” he grunted at me. “You’ve kilt me, I guess.”

  All of a sudden, Homer stood beside me. “He ain’t killed ya,” he said to the fella on the ground. “I have.”

  Homer shot him then, just as calm as you please, right in the front of his head.

  I throwed up. I couldn’t help it.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Marion and Homer wouldn’t let me stay near them dead folks. Once I got to feelin’ better, Marion come over to where I set by the well an’ spoke to me about it.

  “Yer doin’ some better now, I reckon,” he said to me.

  I looked up at him where he blocked the sun an’ stood up. “Yessir,” I said, “I am.”

  “Doan feel bad about gitting’ down a little, this bein’ your first time,” he said. “C’mon with me, now.”

  I followed him around to the rear of the house. He an’ Homer had drug all the bodies up together. Sheriff Winfield Simms was layin’ there, backshot. It was him one a them kilt when he run from the house to give hisself up. The buckskin stood tied to a post on the corral under my saddle. There was two canteens an’ a canvas bag hanging from the horn an’ my bedroll was tied up on the skirt behind the cantle.

  “You git on up there and go back to check on Arliss,” Marion said. “When he’s up to it, come with him back to Gasconade so he can git his wagon and truck. Me an’ Homer’ll wait there for the two of you. Meantime, we’ll git these corpses loaded up and into town and sort everthing out. That all right with you?”

  “Yessir,” I said. “Is my horse dead?”

  “He is.”

  “I hate that,” I said. “There warn’t much wrong with him.”

  “You git gone now, Ruben. Some motion will help settle you out.”

  I went over to the buckskin an’ got on. It took some outa me just to get a leg over the saddle. As I reined him to go, Homer come over an’ looked up at me.

  “You done fine, Rube,” he said. “Just fine. Them was some rank fellers an’ you stood your ground. Nothin’ to feel bad about. Nothing to be ashamed of. You’ll do, boy. You can have my backtrail anytime.”

  I felt tears comin’, but I held onto ‘em. “Thank you, Homer,” I said, an’ I meant it.

  “Yessir,” he said, an’ showed me his back.

  I touched the buckskin an’ he hit a trot. Them tears come then, slow-like, just easin’ down my face, makin’ it a little hard to see. Truth be told though, that buckskin had a fine trot to set.

  I’d been on the trail for about a hour when I realized that it was the middle of the afternoon. I musta kindly lost time settin’ out by that well. Dusk was comin’ when I got near Gasconade but I passed it by an’ made another two or three miles afore I struck camp at a likely spot on a easy slope. I built a fire outa some dead scrub an’ opened the poke they’d hung on the saddle. I found two or three cans a beans, some salt bacon, an’ seven or eight chunks a frybread inside, along with a little bag of coffee and a plug a molasses an’ brown sugar. I took my saddle offa that buckskin, hobbled him, an’ built my fire. I warn’t terrible hungry, but I made some coffee. When it was ready, I put a little a that brown sugar in it. I don’t remember ever tastin’ anything so good afore as that hot coffee with some sweet.

  I was sippin’ on it an’ thinking about what I could remember of the gun fightin’ an’ all, when something shoved my back. It scairt me an’ I whirled around. I musta been really deep in my mind to miss that horse comin’ up behind me an’ pushin’ me with his nose like he done. He nickered at me an’ shook his head.

  “What do ya want when ya act like that?” I asked him. He didn’t poke me no more, but stood there in the light of the fire an’ waited. I broke off a piece of that brown sugar plug an’ held it up. He took it real gentle like, but he didn’t chew it. He just rolled it around in his mouth until it went away. It took me as funny an’ I laughed at him then, maybe more than I shoulda, but not no more than I needed to. It had been a helluva day.

  I was up a little afore daybreak. I went off a ways an’ done my duty. That buckskin warn’t as mannerly an’ shit about ten feet from what was left of the fire. I didn’t take time to eat or nothin’, but wiped the dew offa him an’ saddled up as soon as I could. It was some cooler an’ cloudy that day, an’ we hit it fairly hard. That horse didn’t seem to wear down no more than I did, an’ it was still a little afore dusk when I smelt a fire. A little while later I yelled for him an’ got a answer. I found Arliss settin’ up an’ leaning back on a saddle, eating more a them peaches.

  “Rube,” he said, “proud to see you. Good lookin’ horse you’re settin’ on.”

  I grinned at him as we walked up. “This ol’ plug ain’t worth a durn,” I said. “He et all my sugar.”

  Arliss chuckled. �
�He’ll do that,” he said, “special if whoever has got the sugar is weak-willed. ‘Bout time you got here. I’m near out of peaches.”

  I fussed around settlin’ things for a spell, took the buckskin down to the seep an’ hobbled him near that rented black mare an’ my packhorse, an’ got back just as Arliss put bacon on the fire. It was plain to see he was doin’ better.

  “How come you’re on my horse?” he asked me.

  “Mine got kilt,” I told him. “Feller shot him tryin’ to shoot me. I’m fresh outa horses.”

  Arliss thought for a minute. “I speck you got a fair story to tell,” he said.

  “Yessir, I have.”

  “We’ll git to that in a minute,” Arliss said. “First, I got to tell you the truth about that horse. He ain’t really mine.”

  I was surprised. “He ain’t?” I said.

  “No he ain’t, Rube. That there is your horse. You got yours killed doin’ for me and risking you life too, I reckon. Only fair I replace your mount at least. I call him Willie, but it don’t make no difference what you call him. Horse don’t give a shit what his name is.”

  Even though I didn’t really want to, I started to protest a little, but Arliss cut me off.

  “Boy,” he said, “I’d be dead if it wasn’t for you. Don’t you try to tell me my life ain’t worth more than one horse!”

  “Thank you, Arliss,” I said.

  “Damn right,” he said. “Now tell me about them dirty bastards that shot me.”

  I leaned back agin my saddle an’ did.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Arliss was better right enough, but he warn’t well. He could git to his feet an’ walk some, but if he stood up very long he’d git dizzy like an’ lose his balance if he didn’t set down real quick.

  “I hope I ain’t like this for the rest of my days, Rube,” he said to me on the second morning after I come back to his camp. “I hate to think how distressin’ it would be to just tip over now and then.”

  The thought of him tippin’ over ever so often kindly tickled me an’ I grinned at him.